Towne Theatre

Shortly before 11:00 AM on September 29, 1958, an unexpectedly tragedy happened inside the theater when the manager of the theater, 32-year-old George Mest, attempted to hang himself by leaping out of a ladder and hang from a girder rope in the Towne Theatre’s lobby which at the time was advertising its scheduled showing of the Lewis-Martin comedy “Scared Stiff” and James Stewart’s “Spirit Of St. Louis”.

Fortunately that failed when Mest’s 230-pound body broke the rope and fell to the ground. Tullytown Police Chief John B. Walterick arrived on scene but Mest shouted “CHIEF! ARREST ME! I TRIED TO HANG MYSELF!!” Walterick rushed downstairs from the police station and saw Mest collapsed in the ground as he reached towards him. He was conscious but replied again to the officer that he attempted to hang himself. Mest was taken by Bucks County Rescue Squad to the Lower Bucks County Hospital for treatment.

Authorities reported that Walterick went back inside the theater and found a 3⁄8-inch of manila hemp measuring around 20ft long laying on the floor near the projection room. Walterick then replied that the girder measures 12ft from the ground and Mest had a severe red mark on Mest’s neck when he collapsed in front of the Tullytown police station for questioning before picking up Mest and carried him upstairs to a chair. It was eventually reported that he attempted suicide after three separate incidents, in which his camera was stolen, Mest’s house was burned to the ground, and $1,142.63 being stolen in his office at the Towne Theatre after escaping from police custody in Tullytown, all-in-one the previous day.

According to authorities, two Levittown boys (one from U.S. Army’s AWOL in Fort Dix, New Jersey), 16-year-old Ronald Jackson and 17-year-old Michael Buck, were arrested in Philadelphia during a traffic stop between an officer and their 1941 Ford. Police said that the boys who had parked their car in the Stonybrook section of Levittown near the Towne Theatre were walking to the theater when a Tullytown Police car came up on scene, and circled the area near the theater several times. The youths were able to hide in a small building adjacent to the theater. During questioning, Jackson said that once the police car left, he and Buck used a ladder on the side of the building and were able to climb to the roof of the theater.

Buck, the one from the Army, got into the theater by way of an unlocked trapdoor on the roof and then let Jackson in by a side door. The boys said that they removed the lock from the manager’s office but found no money. They then chiseled the lock off the door of the office containing the theater’s safe, which have an estimate cost of $1,142.63 which they found in the safe located on a shelf. Jackson told police that when they found the amount of money, they considered about only taking a small amount of it, but Jackson told police that they then figured out that they would be in just as much trouble for taking only a small amount of money from a large amount. After the burglary, the two drove in their 1941 Ford all night.

It wasn’t until the following day, on September 28 at 9:00 AM, when Philadelphia Police officer Gerald Blumberg pulled them over for a traffic stop and a routine check. He noticed that he was about to let the two boys go when he noticed Jackson’s jacket on the back seat of the car. He walked to the back side and found all the money hiding underneath the jacket. The two boys were placed under arrest and were turned over back to Tullytown Chief Walterick.

does anyone remember the smaller marquee sign up on the roof facing the levittown parkway? it was positioned over the corner of the second screen in the back.

i went there to see house on the haunted hill 50s and lawrence of arabia i now produce my own spaghetti westerns more than a few dollars for johnny check ytube channel johnny9148 also the ritz in croydon were i saw the blob its sad to see these old theaters demolished also rt 1 drive in spend the night with clint eastwood lol

November 27th, 1974 reopening ad as a twin in the photo section.

does anyone have naything left of the theatre? I owuld be willing to purchase.

Here is a March 1972 ad:
http://tinyurl.com/ybvscjl

The only theatre in the heart of Levittown unless you had your parents drive you up to the huge Route 1 theatre. I remember the original Disney “Herbie the Lovebug” playing at the Towne. Out front they had a real Herbie VW on display on the sidewalk-so cool! Also remember trying to sneak in those big steel side doors. When they knocked it down I happened to be driving by. I bluffed my way on the job site and grabbed some of the stones that were part of the front facade. I gave them out to my siblings and kept one for myself. I now have my own Towne Theatre rock in my back yard garden. Good times!

The Towne Theatre was my neighborhood movie house. It opened in the spring of 1954 with the film “The River of No Return” starring Marilyn Monroe and Robert Mitchum. I attended the first “kiddie” matinee the Saturday following it’s opening. The feature was an animated film, “Johnny the Giant Killer”, a grade Z dubbed film from France. Went there many times. It sat idol for quite some some before demolition in the late 90s. Thw whole Levittown Shopping Center is now a memory. So sad!

The Towne was demolished during the razing of the entire shopping center. Although not on the same side of the street as the Levittown Center, it was across the service road on the north/west side. It probably closed around 1988. I remember seeing Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (4 of us in the audience). It had been twinned by that time.

I recall waiting in line to see “The Godfather” here in 1972 when it was a large, single screen venue. My guess is that it seated 1,300 as a single screen.

I will provide the approximate demolision date.

There is an advertisement for the Towne on this page:
http://tinyurl.com/mssna

This 1970’s pot film had its premiere at the Towne:
http://tinyurl.com/pjzqn